


Blocked

by TechnologicalPigeons



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Awkward Flirting, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Bullying, Crushes, Denial, Denial of Feelings, F/M, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Flirty Lance, Fluff, Long-Distance Relationship, Moving, Online Friendship, Online Romance, Pick-Up Lines, Pidge plays ukuele, Rejection, Singing, Switching Perspectives, Texting, kind of cannon ages?, tags in no order
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-07-11 06:19:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15966473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TechnologicalPigeons/pseuds/TechnologicalPigeons
Summary: A simple message can turn into so much more, whether or not it's wanted. Two teens living on the opposite sides of the country share a strong bond that eventually takes a turn for the worse- but not before even more complications arise.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Notes are at the end! : )

The routine chime of a phone went off as small hands worked their way through wires and circuit boards. The notification displayed it’s self proudly on the lock screen of the device; the owner paid no attention. She was much more interested in the three-dimensional triangle seated in her lap. A few more tweaks proved to satisfy her mind as she closed the metal panel and watched the triangle glow blue. The LED lights were a spontaneous decision but as the machine came to life she became impressed with her decision. Standing up from her place on the floor, legs relieved from sitting so long, she picked up the controller. The door opened from across the room causing her excitement to get the best of her.

“Matt! Look!” She yells across the room, pointing at her most recent creation, “I’m just about to test it, come over here!”

“Ok, I’m coming!” Matt laughed, walking over to join his younger sister. He leaned over to her after staring at the glowing triangle for a moment, “Does your new creation have a name?”

“Yup,” she chimed, “His name is Rover, or them. Robots tend to not have a gender.” Matt gave her a smile, “Rover huh? I like it.”

“I thought it would fit, but now we just need to know if he works or not. The last trial run was a disaster if you remember correctly.” She said quickly powering on the controller and checking the surroundings for potential hazards. “Oh yeah, the fire… That wasn’t a good day. Rest in peace triangle test number six.” He joked in a mock prayer, head bowed and hands together witch received him a smack from the younger girl.

“Stop it! Ok now let’s see if this works.”

“I’ve been waiting.”

“Shush.”

With little hesitance, she flipped a few switches and the sound of a gentle mechanical hum could be heard. Moving the joystick up she muttered to herself, “Just like a video game”.She held her breath for a mere moment as ‘Rover’ made no movements, her doubts started rushing in at full force as too how it wouldn’t work. Those thoughts were interrupted and her eyes suddenly widened with joy as the triangle glowed a bit brighter and picked itself off of the floor. The two siblings smiled wide and took a few steps back as it took to the air via the control of the girl.

“Great job Katie.” Matt smiled, enveloping his younger sister into a side hug.

“The controls are working smoothly now and it's reacting on time to the commands, definitely an upgrade from ‘Triangle Test Number 6.’” She joked before passing the controller off to Matt so he could feel the fluidity of the controls.

He glanced over at his proud sister, “I’m going to miss you, you know that right?” he said with a soft smile. She met his eyes only to look down at the floor, “I just wish you and dad didn’t have to go.”

“Don’t worry Pigeon, we’ll be back before you know it!!” He smiled wide and Katie laughed, covering her mouth out of self-consciousness. “I’m holding you to that.”

 

Waves were exchanged as Katie’s only brother and father entered one of the family’s cars and drove away. Looking up she saw her mother have tears in her eyes, Katie could only smile and think of what her family could accomplish on this trip. They were going to a lab to help researches who claimed they had found alien life. Her father and brother were lucky enough to be the ones called in, a priceless opportunity that she was devastated to not be a part of. They had no idea when the other half of the family would return, hopefully within a few months and with more info than ever.

The girls stood outside in the driveway for a moment more just watching the other cars pass their long driveway. The sun was setting as Katie’s mom ushered her inside fretting about the cold even when the temperature had barely changed from earlier. Katie bounded up the stairs two at a time, her light brown hair flowing behind her. In a rus,h she threw open her door, closed it just as feverishly wincing at the loud bang it made, and threw herself on the bed in glee. Many, like her mother, would be sad to see half of their family going off to a lab for however many months, but Katie was still transfixed on how much of an accomplishment this was. Her brother and father going to help with evidence that could lead to alien life? Unbelievable! She had always believed in aliens, and Matt and her used to decode messages in preparation for when aliens sent messages to earth. The idea made her ecstatic, and now there was a chance that it would happen.

The teen squeezed her pillow and let out an out of character squeal before sitting up, throwing the pillow across her room and centering herself. This was no time for useless fangirling about potential situations. Maybe the who investigation would flop, there was no reason to get her hopes up now. Now there was something she needed to do… she scanned her room slowly, racking her brain for what she needed to remember. Her eyes fell on her phone sitting idly on her dress across from her bed. Oh yeah! The notification light still rang strong from earlier today, she had seen the light earlier and planned to see what it was before but it slipped from her mind sometime before dinner. She hopped up and walked over, picking up her phone and seeing it was a chat message- “Katie!”

Her mom yelled from at the bottom of the stairs drawing Katie’s attention away from her device and to her door that the briskly opened. “Yeah?” she called back, wondering what her mother would want at the moment.

“Did you do the dishes today? The kitchen is a mess.”

“Uhh…” She hesitated, looking for a loophole as to get out of extra chores. “It was Matts turn to do it?” She offered with an anxious smile. Her smile was erased quickly as her mom laughed and yelled at her to come down stairs and clean up the kitchen. Like the good daughter she was, she obeyed. The phone was forgotten and left for a sink of dirty dishes, and empty dishwasher and a grimy counter.

Thirty minutes later and Katie found herself in the bathroom brushing out her obnoxious hair. The voice in the back of her head nagged her to take out the shears and chop it all off but something kept her from doing that. “Not today.” She muttered tearing the brush through the tangles once more. Maybe if she destroyed the ends enough then she could find it in herself to chop it, screw the ‘brush from the bottom’ rule, she could do what she wanted. Her previous purple dress, her mother’s favorite, had been replaced with green alien boxers, a gift from Matt last Christmas, and an oversized Star Trek t-shirt. After the deed was done her hair looked only slightly better than before, but she still breathed a sigh of relief before braiding the smoothed mess. The other night she didn’t brush it and she woke up to the nightmare of spending thirty minutes trying to control it to just ultimately give up and pass the brush off to her mom.

Back in her room she grabbed her phone and flopped onto her bed once more, she felt a little bad for leaving this person on hold for an entire day, but at the same time she assumed it was a bot or something. No one ever messaged her, not even her friends. They knew better then to try and text her because no matter how much of a tech geek she was that tech rarely included her phone. She wasn’t attached to that thing as much as all other fourteen-year-old girls were, she had other things to work on. She clicked on the phone and tapped on the notification with barely even a glance, if it was a link and an ominous message she was going to be- wait.

Her eyes widened at the message, presumably by a real person for the bizarre text that she read, once, twice. What was this?

  **9:42am**

**[new message from: Sharpshooter]**

_If you were a laser, you’d be set on stunning ; )_

_Just kidding haha_

_Wait no, I mean you probably are stunning I was just dropping in to say cool robot_

_Did you get it to work?_

**[Accept message?] [yes] [no]**

The hell? What kind of joke was this; her mind went full speed trying to decipher the message only to get her nowhere. Of course she would over analyze this, her mind simply agreed that this was not a joke and more so someone with a flirty attitude complimenting her work. Still one of the more questionable messages she had gotten. Soon enough she found herself tapping ‘yes’ and typing out her own response.

**11:34pm**

_Yes, I just got it to work this afternoon_

_The bugs seem to all be worked out but we won’t know for sure until we can properly test it_

She sent it with a content sigh, placing her phone down and deciding now was the time to remove the constricting bra that she still had on. Half way out of the contraption, shirt still on of course, she froze to see typing bubbles pop up on her screen. This guy was online.

This guy was online and _responding._

_We huh?_

_It a group effort or something because u seemed pretty proud of yourself_

_Well of course I’m proud of myself!_

_I’m building a functional robot. do you have any idea how big this is for me?_

_Nope!_

_Care to tell me? ; )_

Katie blinked slowly, looking at her phone for a good minute before snapping out of her daze and throwing her bra across the room into her hamper. Feeling free she leaned back against her pillows and fell back into a trance. Was this guy flirting with her? Or was he genuinely curious. Was he even a guy? What if he was some creepy old guy who was going to- wait. Why did she care so much anyway?

She’s gotten plenty of messages before but this was the first time she had ever cared so much. Normally it was a message or two and the conversation would be over. Despite it all her fingers began moving on their own.

**11:40pm**

_It started as a group effort with my brother but he got busy so I started working on it solo_

_I’ve wanted to build a robot since I was a little kid_

_All of my tests didn’t work the best but this time I got it to work._

_So yes I am proud of myself and it is a big thing._

_Wow that’s hella cool_

_Did you seriously just say hella?_

_Why does everyone have a problem with that_

_Wtf_

_Because no one says hella_

_Well I say hella so ha!_

_I’m somebody!_

_Glad you are proud of yourself_

_Thanks : )_

 

Katie got up and plugged her in placing it back on the dresser before pulling her covers back and getting ready to sleep. This would be one of the earliest times she slept in about a month. The whole Rover project had her up all night along with spending as much time possible with Matt before he left. As soon as she got comfortable her phone sent off a tell-tale ping. She got up a little too fast.

She grabbed her phone and retreated to her bed, getting comfortable before reading the new message.

**11:55pm**

_So_

_Tell me about yourself_

_You want to know about me?_

_Why?_

_Idk you seem interesting_

_I like peanut butter_

_And peanut butter cookies_

_But I hate peanuts_

_Wait_

_How can you like all that but not peanuts?_

_They are too dry_

_Annnd that makes sense? I guess?_

_Wait but what about crunchy peanut butter??_

_What about it?_

_It’s peanut butter but it also has whole peanuts in it soooo_

_Who in their right mind would eat crunchy peanut butter lol_

_mE_

Katie had to stifle a small laugh. This person was a unique one for sure, especially because he tried to keep the conversation going. Tried in which he succeeded and now Katie forgoes her previous promise to go to bed early tonight. So far all she knew about them was that they though her robot was cool, says hella, and eats chunky peanut butter for some reason. A weird list of things to know about a total stranger but a list it was.

_Don’t disrespect crunchy peanut butter eaters_

_I’m sorry we all can’t be as fancy as you_

_I’m pretty sure crunchy is more expensive than smooth_

_…_

_Oh god don’t tell me that_

_My life is a lie now thanks_

_It’s not that bad_

_yeS IT IS_

_Hold up what time is it for you there?_

_12:17am_

_Shit dude_

_You live at the other side of the country, shouldn’t you be asleep?_

_Probably_

_Yeah I’m going to leave you to sleep_

_I’ll talk to you later ; )_

She froze reading the last message a noticing Sharpshooters green light disappear noting they was offline. They would talk to her later, what did that mean? Her mind spun a but trying to comprehend the fact that that just talked to a complete stranger about the stupidest things and now they want to talk more? She really didn’t believe it would happen.

Finally, her phone ended up where it was supposed to be and she drifted off into a dreamless sleep

The school bell rang as clear as static in Katie’s mind while she walked the unnaturally long halls of her high school. Other students walked passed in in groups of friends chatting idly about teachers for the year. Anxiously Katie tugged on the bottom of her uniform skirt and took a deep breath. She was a freshman, but she had nothing to worry about, this place was a private school they had smart people come here all the time. She had managed to score a lot of her classes at a higher level besides her electives, but those could stay where they were. Katie had a lot on her plate anyway. Entering her first class, she found her seat and heard a small chime emitting from her bag. In a flurry of panic, she froze and looked around the room only to find that no one seemed to notice or care. The phone was quickly silenced with a sigh as she read the notification was from Sharpshooter. Apparently they weren’t lying when they said they would talk to her later, whether that was good or bad was debatable in Katie’s eyes.

It was currently five thirty am and Lance had finally worked up the courage to press the send button. It also took him that much time to roll out of bed. He had been awake since four because he remembered that summer homework was a thing that needed finished. If he brought in a half finished book report Iverson would never get off his ass. Dropping his phone half hazard onto his bed he stretched his arms, arching his back in the process and feeling his joints pop. His uniform sat proudly on his desk and he grabbed it in one swoop and beeline for the bathroom.

“Oh come on!” Cried one of his nephews when Lance claimed the bathroom first. “Hey! I need to be at school way earlier than you so I have priority!” He laughed, shutting the door on the younger boy. The one problem with having a big family was the bathroom, and of course all the noise and different things that come with everyone but Lance didn’t know what he would do without them. He set his skin care caddy on the small counter and began his routine at full speed, if he could get his skin nice in the allotted time then he was going to do it. He had standards! Or at least that’s what he liked to think with his appearance. Wash, exfoliate, tone and moisturize- followed by sunscreen because that shit was the secret to life. Also despite his tan complexion whenever he was in direct sunlight he seemed to get a lot of freckles and that was a source of insecurity. He wasn’t as mad at them as he had been before, but he used to be bullied for them so you can’t blame a guy.

“Face washed, teeth brushed… contacts where are you?” He muttered, squinting around the shelves in search for a small blue case. His eyesight wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t good so the contacts were a bit of a must. He rarely wore his glasses outside of his home, and due to that most people were none the wiser. A small thing he kept to himself out of pride, a small insignificant piece of pride that he really didn’t understand himself.

“Lance come on! Its six you need to leave in twenty minutes!” His sister yelled just as he got the second contact in. “Thanks Veronica! I’m coming out.” He responded throwing his stuff back into their respective places and exiting the bathroom in favor of his room to find his bag. He threw last minute essentials into it, took a glance in his mirror and to smooth out any obnoxious wrinkles that may have formed on his uniform.

With a wave to his family in the kitchen he was set, pulling on his shoes and stepping outside. It was a brisk five minute walk to his stop where he waited alone as a junior without a car, it wasn’t that he couldn’t drive, but more so the fact that his family couldn’t afford him a car so he was working to get one himself. Even if they did have the money he wouldn’t have let them pay for it, they were already doing so much for him by getting him into the Garrison private school so he could pursue his dream of becoming a piolet. Not to mention how expensive drivers ed was combined with the school costs… he felt like he needed to be making his own keep for a long time. He was lucky enough to get a few small jobs this year that he’d be tackling after school. A small smile crept up on his face as the bus rolled up, he entered with a polite good morning to the driver and took his seat.

He took a glance at his phone and mentally slapped himself for forgetting about time differences, the message had been delivered to the robot kid, or otherwise known by their username TechPigeons, Lance subconsciously called them Pidgee after that one bird Pokémon. He’d have to ask their name if they ever kept talking. He really hoped they did.

The day started off great, he met up with Hunk to find out they had the same first period, he found Keith and started singing Mad World at him while the senior proceeded to grimace and ignore him. It was the little things in life that mattered like having classes with your best bro and annoying Keith.

“Hey Lance, are you excited? This is the second to last year of this school and then we can graduate and get on the field!” Hunk exclaimed excitedly. Lance laughed and smiled with his buddy, “Of course I am! This is my dream and we are already so close. Just as long as Iverson doesn’t kill me then I’ve got a pretty good shot at succeeding.”

Hunks smile dropped as he looked over and pouted at the teacher, “I can’t believe this is the second year in the row that we are stuck with him.”

“Yeah I’m positive he rigged the schedules.”  Lance sighed, dropping his head into his hand only to be startled by an irritated voice behind him.

“Why are you guys complaining?” The guy asked with a little more passion than necessary, “Iverson is one of the best teachers, anyone would have killed to be in this course two years.”

Glancing over at Hunk, Lance noted that he was making subtle but still very obvious signs to ignore whatever was just said. Instead Lance sighed heavily, “How can you be so sure? You’ve never had him before James.” Lance’s back was still turned to the guy but he could tell that James what not happy about the bored and borderline bitchy tone Lance just gave him. Never had he been so glad for Iverson to walk into the room and bang his hands on the table to demand silence. For once that man’s voice was of an angel… and then it fell apart a moment later when Lance missed his name on roll call and got chewed out, but not without a triumphant huff from James behind him. Never had Lance been so proud of Keith punching someone in the face. Lance gave a small smile despite it all, this day would be great anyway.

The day wasn’t great.

Iverson, as well as being the hardest teacher in all of the Garrison, doubled as a killer Hall Monitor. Not killer as in cool, but killer as in he will end your life. Conveniently so, he and Hunk were just standing in the halls, they had roughly two hours before school was finished for the day and they were talking about all the work they had to do. Iverson was floating in the background like he always did with groups who hung in the halls. The pair was used to it so no mind was paid and Iverson was just about to move on when it happened.

Lances fucking phone chimed.

His breathing stopped and he froze as Iverson turned around and gave a menacing glare. “Mclain, we have a very strict policy on-“

“No phones under any circumstances that don’t involve an immediate emergency. If it’s on you it must be silent and not seen, I know the drill sir.” Lance recited, dare he say Iverson looked a tad impressed underneath his irritation.

“You know the drill because this has happened before. I would have hoped you had learned your lesson last year.” He stated looking him in the eye, “Why should I give you a pass.”

“Uh, sir?” Hunk chimed, oh thank god for Hunk. Lance would never not be in his debt, “It is the first day back and old habits tend to die hard. Let’s say this is Lance’s one warning on the matter and call it good? Sir?” He offered, adding the ‘sir’ in last minute. Iverson stared at the pair before grunting and moving on. With that Lance breathed a heavy sigh of relief and promised Hunk his life, which Hunk humbly declined.

As the bell rang a moment later Lance slipped his phone out of his pocket to silence it. Blue eyes widened at the sight of a reply from the robot kid. Lance let a small smirk slip on his face as he tossed his phone into the pocket of his bag, the pickup lines always work.

…

The bus ride home was chaotic and it started raining on Lance’s walk back home making him mildly irritated. It’s not that he didn’t like the rain, he loved it actually, but now he would be going home wet with a pile of homework to do so it wasn’t ideal. But that didn’t stop him from walking a normal pace, if he was going to get wet he might as well get wet.

The house was relatively quiet when he arrived. Everyone was either still at school or working leaving Lance just enough time to get the bulk of his work done in peace. Although the silence was nice, too much of it for two long made him uncomfortable. Growing up in such a space where things were going on twenty-four-seven did that to you, some things you just get accustomed too and that was noise for Lance. He opened up the main pocket of his bag and happily dumped all the contents out on his semi-made bed. This was a habit he had adopted back in junior high when he always had missing assignments because they were lost in the bottom of the bag. It also promoted keeping his bag clean because he didn’t want a bunch of nasty shit all over his bed. It had happened once and he vowed to never again let a packet of crackers get smashed by all of his stuff and wind up in the bottom of his bag. Junior high was a dark time.

Everyone says high school sucks but lance didn’t really understand that. Sure, it was school, that place is never actively desired in Lances head but because of his dreams he has semi forced his way into excitement after the first year. If you wanted to talk about a major shithole, it would have been middle school. God that place fucking sucked. High school is perfectly mediocre depending on who you are, but middle school was a shit show.

Among all of his books and papers he noticed his phone, a blue notification light shone brightly on his phone. He laughed for a moment, he couldn’t believe he had gotten in trouble because this random ass person decided to message him at the most _convenient_ time. He’d have to bring it up just to an upper hand of some sort. The screen unlocked quickly and lead him to the conversation.

**5:30** **am**

_Are you made of copper and tellurium? Because you're CuTe_

**1:06 pm**

_I hate how this was how I almost got in trouble at school._

_Do you always flirt with random strangers?_

**2:40 pm**

_Only you ; )_

_And wait what do you mean almost??_

_YOU DID GET ME IN TROUBLE SERIOUSLY I GOT CHEWED OUT YOU CANT COMPLAIN_

Lance gawked at the audacity of this guy to complain about almost getting in trouble. Well, he wasn’t really complaining more so stating a fact but Lance was salty today and he was making it apparent. The time difference did not work in their favor, but wasn’t this Pigeon person supposed to be super smart or something? They build a robot! A triangular robot that Lance really didn’t know the use for, but a robot nonetheless! Also not to forget, Lance knew nothing about this guy what so ever- no gender, no name, no age, nothing. He screwed up his face in contemplation, did he really want to know more about this guy? The house was suddenly all too quiet as the teen thought to himself, spinning half way in the old, cheap office chair he sat in. It wasn’t a good chair by the way. It felt like it was made from burlap and the fabric was unsticking from the cushion that resembled an old mattress- the hand me downs in the family were never that strong.

He took a last glance at his stoic phone sitting next to him before leaning over to his bed and grabbing some papers he needed to take notes on. Having a small room lead to easy and direct access to pretty much everything. If this guy decided to answer, then Lance would make an effort to know them.

It’s not like he had anything to lose.

…

Now this was more his speed.

It was later in the day and the house was bursting with noise all the way from his niece and nephew to his mom and grandma cooking. Veronica was just hanging out and leaching off of their food despite the fact that she didn’t even live there anymore. Lance couldn’t argue with her though, he’d probably do the same thing.

The sun was slowly setting as the large family finally sat down to eat. Still a hectic event, but wholesome. It was one that another family would look at and judge, but despite the noise and the clutter, it was his family.

“So Lance, how was the first day back at school?” His mom started with a smile. “Oh, you know. Pretty good!”

“I heard he got in trouble.” Veronica smirked taking a bite of her food as all eyes turned to Lance.

“Well it wasn’t a big deal! Nothing bad happened I just got corrected on something!” he nervously laughed, glaring daggers at his older sister. She just shrugged apologetically. “My phone just went off in the halls and Iverson happened to be near so I got chewed out! This happens every year, and I promise it won’t happen again.” He continued to explain, eyes flickering throughout his family until they seemed disinterested and continued with their meal. How did Veronica even find out about the incident anyway? Also why did she even deem it worthy enough to share?

Dinner continued at a casual pace of small, but loud, talk. It was rowdy but home making Lance happy. His family was the one thing that could cheer him up even when he wasn’t sad. The thought if leaving them for aviation hurt, but he wouldn’t let it stand in his way- it’s not like they’ll be gone when he gets back. On the bright side he still had two more years to go before he moved out! That was still a long while to go.

But of course his family comes with the consequence of teasing too. Clearing and washing the dishes came with the most convenient time for his phone to go off.

“Lance you got a text!” His brother called, “you got a girlfriend or something.” He laughed. Somehow the small comment caused Lance to fluster a bit, unfortunately not leaving unnoticed.

“Oh, so it is your girlfriend!”

“No it isn’t! But of cours,e girls would be all over me!”

“But she isn’t your girlfriend?” He asked, looking confused.

“No!” It was Lance’s turn to laugh as he picked up his phone, “It’s just some guy who really likes robots.”

“Sounds like Hunk.” Veronica chipped in. “Kind of like Hunk, but saltier. But Hunk isn’t salty at all so… I guess they’re on the opposite sides of the spectrum.” He pondered, “Anyway, the kitchens all done right?”

“Go, have fun talking to your boyfriend.” Veronica laughed with a wave.

“He’s not my- never mind.” Lance sighed he sighed and exited the kitchen with a small smile.

“You know, for someone who says he gets all the ladies he’s pretty quick to deny he’s in a relationship.” His brother stated, “Our brother’s a player.” Was all Veronica had to say back. Her brother was a player for sure.

**7:20 pm**

_You actually got in trouble?_

_No thanks to you!_

_My teacher is fucking anal about phones_

_Wait, then why didn’t you silence it?_

_I forgot to!_

_And it’s not like anyone texts me_

_Wait no_

_I mean the ladies know to not text me in class_

_Smooth save_

_Right?_

_It was a joke_

Lance winced, that was a bullet in his chest- a dent in his pride. Was he really that easy to see through? Or did he just mess up those messages so badly.

_Are you a student?_

_Yeah? Why else would I have a teacher mr.improbablyawealthycollegekid_

_Lol me? I’m a high schooler._

_…_

_I don’t believe you_

 

A high schooler? He didn’t believe it. This guy was fucking with him.

_A freshman at that_

_What are you? A broke college kid?_

_…_

_Still don’t believe you but I’m a high schooler too_

_How the hell are you only a freshman??_

_I’ve been working on robots and stuff my entire life!_

_I’m not going to be bad at it, so what if I’m a first year._

_It’s just not what I expected_

_What else do I not know about you?? Hmmmm???_

_I’m a freshman and you can call me Pidge._

_Well I was close enough with the name!_

_You were what?_

_Mentally I was calling you Pidgee and robot kid so Pidge is closer enough to Pidgee so that_

_deserves me a point._

_Sure whatever you say lol._

_The name is Lance by the way,_

_But people call the the Taylor because of how I thread the needle ; )_

_So which one is it?_

_What?_

_Lance or Taylor?_

_No no its lance but that other one was a joke?_

_Did you not get it?_

_It’s a- never mind_

_I would have thought a protégé like you would get it._

_I’m surprised someone like you would remember the diacritics in words._

_…Autocorrect is a lovely thing_

_It’s nice to meet you Pidge ; )_

_Nice to meet you too, T a y l o r_

_THE NAMES LANCE_

_Woops my bad_

_You are a horrible human being_

_Oh really? Glad you noticed_

_Jesus_

_Way to be shady dude_

_Ha : )_

 

Phone in hand, Katie scolded herself for making the decision to stay up again talking to a complete stranger.

“Lance,” she murmured staring at the screen, “What kind of name is Lance?”

Sure, she was unnecessarily bitter at the boy. He kept her up later than she wanted to be, or more so later than her mother wanted her to be. He didn’t know that though, he most likely forgot about the time difference that they shared. It was almost eleven and she sat on her bed with the phone in her hands contemplating what the other was thinking. Was he waiting for a better response? Was he going to start typing again? Keep the conversation going?

Did he actually care about the person on the other side of the screen? They typing bubbles popped up, and down, up again, and down. He didn’t know what to say. Katie heard her mom step up the stairs and she quickly stashed her phone under the covers and ran to barricade the closed door with her body.

“Katie?” Her mother knocked.

“I’m changing!” she yelled in response. It wasn’t a lie, she had just gotten out of the shower and only had a towel wrapped around her. She had meant to change, but Lance got in her way. That was a weird thing for Katie to think about- a boy getting in her way. It’s not like they were friends or anything, just two strangers exchanging a few teasing words.

Yeah, that was all.

Moving away from her door she forgot all about her towel causing it to nearly fall all the way off her body. She caught it around her waist until looking forward to see her opened window and quickly fell to the floor in hopes to cover her exposed chest. A flush covered her face, her mind finding every way to yell at her. There was no one in the neighbor’s yard, so she should be safe easing herself out of the small panic she had. She was such an idiot. That window was always open with the blinds tied back because it’s such a hassle to close them every time she changed. Yes, it was a stupid way to think of it, but she was normally better about it!

Under the covers her phone buzzed drawing out an annoyed groan from the girl.  Why did she shove her phone under her covers? Impulse, her mind fed her.

What has she to even hide?

A boy?

Pretty pathetic.

readjusting her towel, she threw back her covers and grabbed her phone, sinking down into the pale carpet next to her bed. She could get dressed later, right now this was the priority.

For some strange reason.


	2. Chapter 2

This was anything but ideal.

Katie had just wrapped up her conversation with Lance. It wasn’t a meaningful conversation in the slightest, it was more of the one you would have with an old friend featuring jokes disguised as insults. She really didn’t find out much about the guy except for the fact that his name was Lance, he was in high school and somewhat of a player- not the ideal guy, but he was funny and seemed to have a heart. It was nice and all, but now she was stuck staring at a dresser drawer cursing herself out. She hadn’t done laundry rendering the majority of her clothes useless.

On several occasions it wouldn’t bother her, she had worn the exact same sets of clothes for days on end despite her mother’s protests. Somedays she worked all throughout the nights without a thought of self-hygiene. Right now though it was out of the question and she was all out of fucking underwear. Only one pair remained buried beneath some old pajama pants that she hadn’t worn in years. Katie grimaced plucking the offending piece of clothing out of the drawer and dropping it on the floor, it shouldn’t have had to come to this. In front of her laid a thong, a more modest one than not, but she still was struggling to find reasons to wear them. The undergarment had been a freebie back in seventh grade when she was dragged out shopping with some old friends. One of them had received it and slipped it in Katie’s bag and refused to take it back. Never did she think she would ever stoop this low.

First time for everything.

She dropped her towel, thankfully out of sight from the window, and forcefully pulled the thong on. It fit her just right making the teen let out a strangled noise of frustration. There was no going back now. It didn’t go in between her cheeks like the string throngs, but it got awfully close. Other than being a little uncomfortable and the relentless readjusting, she figured she could tolerate it for the night.

She found more clothes that she hadn’t seen in years and slipped them on. She was really bad at cleaning out her old clothes.

Her mom shook her head at Katie stumbled down the stairs holding an overflowing basket of clothes.

“Finally laundry day is it?” She teased, “You’re dropping clothes Katie.”

“I know, I know!” She yelled, “I’ll pick them up, don’t worry!” The laundry room was thankfully void of any other clothes and the machines were hers for the taking. Colleen watched as her daughter aggressively shoved clothes into the washer. This was a common occurrence to do laundry last minute and it was always an amusing sight to see her youngest in clothes she received years ago that finally fit her.

“Where did you get that top?” She asked, halting her daughter’s actions referring to the pale tank top with blue trimming that she adorned. “Oh this?” Katie took a moment to think, slowing her fight with the laundry, “I’m not sure.” She shrugged, “it was just in my dresser.”

“I swear I never know where you get your clothes.” Colleen sighed watching Katie go back to shoving her tattered clothes into the washer. “Mmm.” Was all she got in response.

“We’re going shopping tomorrow to replace your torn clothes.” She stated exiting the laundry room.

“Ok.” Katie mumbled shutting the washer door a little too aggressively, “Wait what?” She halted fully realizing what her mother just said. “Why are we going shopping!? My clothes are fine!” She yelled running to the kitchen where her mother was turning off the lights.

“Your clothes are atrocious Katie. You look like you live in the garage, reckon you pretty much do, but you need to own some nice clothes that aren’t covered in metal shavings and grease.”

“But why can’t you go out and by me clothes by yourself?” She protested.

Colleen let out a heavy sigh, turning to face her youngest lit by the last remaining light on in the house. “Because if I did that you would never wear any of the clothes I get you. Anyway, it’s way too late for you to be up. Go up to bed, ok? I’ll pick you up after school and we will go then.”

Katie didn’t even find it reasonable to argue with her mother right now. She was right despite the protests. Her clothes were a mess and her mother always bought things she would never wear. She flicked the final light off and ran up the stairs and to her room. Shutting the door, she picked the stupid thong out of her ass and fell into her bed, not even bothering with her wet hair- she would deal with it later.

God tomorrow was going to suck.

The day was going great.

It was the second day of school and Lance hadn’t been yelled at once! Well that and the fact that Iverson called in a sub for his class today so that probably had to do with the lack of yelling. Along with that he had remembered to silence his phone with the help of Hunk. He had no idea what he would do without him, probably flunk out or something.

It's not that he wasn’t smart, this was a pretty fancy school for anyone’s standards so he had to earn his spot here. Without Hunk would get kicked out for discipline issues like Keith was on his way too. Lance had no idea what Keith’s deal was but he almost felt bad for the kid- emphasis on almost, they had a rivalry going on and he couldn’t afford weakness!

“Hey Hunk,” Lance whispered, “What’s up with Keith?”

“Bro you ask me every time and I still don’t understand your problem with him- wait actually what is up with Keith?” The Samoan directed his attention to where Lance was staring. Keith was just sitting in the commons at one of tables minding his own, but something was off in Lance’s eyes.

“He looks, sad?” Hunk determined. “Sad??” Lance gasped, “I can’t let my rival be sad!”

“Lance that doesn’t make sense-“

“Yes it does now to go cheer up Keith!”

Hunk had no time to react as Lance got up and walked over to Keith’s table slamming his hands down on it effectively startling the other boy. The two had a staring contest that Hunk continued to watch from afar in confusion.

“Uh, you ok?” Keith questioned.

“Am I ok?” Lance gasped, being way to offended by the question. “The real question is are _you_ ok? You look sad buddy.”

“Uh,” It would be a lie to say that Keith didn’t look effectively shocked. “I thought you were bent on the rivalry that we don’t have, why would you care?”

Lance dramatically sighed and rested his head on a hand, leaning in a bit. “Because I’m not soulless and I can’t have my rival be sad if it wasn’t by my doing.”

“You’ve actually never been anything more to me than a nuisance.”

“Right? And that’s pretty sad!” Lance responded with way too much enthusiasm. Keith looked about ready to slam either his head into a wall or Lances, there was really no saying. But Lances mission was completed with Keith gave a small laugh. “Yeah that’s pretty sad.”

“Ha! And now you aren’t sad anymore. Lance saved the say once again!” He said triumphantly. “Don’t speak in the third person again who does that?” Keith mumbled.

“I do just to piss you off.” Lance smiled.

“Ok wait, so you come over here to try and cheer me up just to piss me off again?”

“Yeah pretty much.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“That’s because you are really dense!” Lance smiled, getting up from the table and shooting finger guns at the senior before joining a confused Hunk.

“So, “Hunk started, looking at an overly cocky Lance, “That thirty second conversation made no sense.”

“Yeah I winged it, was it ok?”

“I think you chipped your wings on a mountain dude.”

Lance winced, “OK that hurts.”

He shrugged, “You asked! I don’t even know why you two are rivals, it’s never made any sense. At one point you guys don’t even know each other and the next you two are ‘neck and neck’. There was no in-between.”

“Rivalries that don’t make any sense are the best! That way no one knows why it exists besides the two who are rivals, so now no one can have any reason to get involved.” Lance smiled, holding open the outside door for Hunk. He looked about as confused as they come. “But why would you even want a rival?” Hunk demanded.

Lance halted his steps making Hunk turn around to see him as he stood there in silence. A moment went by before Lance shrugged and continued walking, a small laugh escaping him, “I guess it just makes high school more interesting.”

Lance arrived to his next class with little time to spare, roughly thirty seconds he could spend to pull out his supplies for class. Instead he scanned the room and pulled out his phone. The time difference between him and Pidge was three hours if he remembered correctly, so if he messaged him now than he’d get it at four because that is the time over there… right? He took the chance anyway and shot the kid a text- if he got a response then his phone would be on silent, he could respond after school. Lance gave himself a mental pat on the back for being so smart- not that he usually wasn’t smart but he tended to rush things without thinking it out. One of his small flaws that have been revealed throughout the years.

“Lance is that a phone I see?” The girl sitting next to him inquired with a teasing smile.

“No, it’s a calculator.” He joked back. The girl’s smile brightened a bit but fell back into a strong bitch face as the teacher entered the room. Lance had known that girl last year in science, her name was Romelle if he remembered correctly, which he did. And also her name was printed on her notebook.

He couldn’t help it! He was just bad with names and he always had been. He was lucky enough to remember names if he pounded them into his brain enough but somedays he couldn’t, for the life of him, remember. But it was fine, not like he would have to play a guessing game with people’s names. He knew the important ones and that was enough to get him by without trouble.

The teacher mumbled some words and the class started.

To Lance’s glee this teacher was one of the lamest teachers in the school. He would stand up front, put instructions on the screen and count on people to complete the tasks in a reasonable amount of time. He never enforced anything in this class, and as nice as that may be, he was the reason people got kicked out. Lance liked to think of the room as one huge test in which you are given a series of task and if not done correctly then you fail. That was exactly how his class worked. That didn’t mean Lance did work in class though.

He copied down the tasks in a notebook and shoved his stuff back in his bag. He would use his phone to take a picture but he had previously witnessed the teacher chuck another student’s phone at a wall. Lame didn’t mean chill in the slightest. If Lance was to be completely honest, the guy was mental.

Just a little.

Lance glanced over at Romelle again once finishing his list of notes. She was tapping the back end of a pencil against her pursed lips, reading once, twice, her eyes flittered across the words on the screen so many times that Lance had every right to claim she had read it at least fifteen times over. She was an interesting girl, cute, but very interesting. She wore her hair in uniform pigtails every day, sometimes more disheveled then others. She always tried to come up with different ways to copy these notes, it was only the second day and it seemed she had resorted to memorization.

“How’s it going for ya?” Lance leaned over and said in a hushed voice. Everyone else was being loud but he thought it would be fun to try something different. Romelle let out an annoyed sigh and leaned back in her chair, “Why does this creep have to write sentences like this? It’s so bizarre!”

“I think it’s part of his plan to make us do work in class.” Lance laughed, watching the blonde’s face brighten, “If he can get us to write some shit down because it’s virtually impossible to memorize, that’s teaching.”

“Ah, teachers sure are pathetic now days. Also why are you whispering.”

He hesitated, “Because isn’t that what you are supposed to do in class?” Lance laughed, voice raising to a normal volume. “Not in this class.” Romelle assured, “I could probably scream and no one could care. I’m pretty sure the teacher can’t even hear.” The taller teen took a moment to think before shrugging and agreeing with her.

She was a really nice girl, super cute and unique but for some reason Lance never had an intent to flirt with her. He was known for being the Lover Boy™, but when it came to Romelle he just couldn’t see it. Hunk liked to laugh about it because she happened to be the only girl who tolerated Lance on a daily basis. He used to be really close with a another girl, Allura, and he had a massive crush on her for a long time. Eventually after some trial and error and some, cough cough, rebound on Alluras part, Lance figured out that he was done. He was still bitter about it, but still made an act of seeing Allura every once in a while despite how it twisted his heart in nasty ways. He was strong, he could power through the pain. He tried to believe that it wasn’t just his damaged pride talking.

**3:59 pm**

_Hey!_

_How’s it going ; )_

‘Hey how’s it going?’ Oh Pidge wished she could tell him just how it was going. She was in fucking pain; this was a new way of suffering on her part. She glared down at her phone, trying her best to block out the sparkly black floor under her feet. Her fingers ached to type out her current predicament, ‘ Oh yeah I’m doing just fucking peachy. I’m wearing a cursed _thong_ out on an unwilling shopping trip to look for clothes that I don’t want and currently I am trapped in Victoria’s Secret- the cursed store of glitter floors and fifty dollar bras.’ It wasn’t worth it on her end, why did less fabric equate to more money in places like this. The only place where logic like that works is strip clubs. But she had to admit this place looked like a goddamn strip club.

Instead of answering with her pathetic reasons for wanting to die on the spot, she just closed her phone and looked to find her mom. She could come back to the message later, who cares if she left him on read, she was busy suffering and he was probably still in school. Why he had the inclination to message her while he was in class was beyond her, maybe he was just one of those guys. Also she had received this message an hour ago and was only now seeing it so in her mind that was a valid enough reason to not reply even though it absolutely wasn’t.

Her mom was browsing through one of the many tubs on unorganized bras when Katie got to her. Colleen took one look at her daughter and dragged her to the back of the store. “We are going to get you sized because its definitely different from last time.” She said making Katie inhale a sharp breath. This stuff was just weird to talk about, even if it was done in a place covered in skimpy underwear, it was still weird.

“Why can’t I just wear sports bras my whole life? I already know my size, it’s a small.” Katie suggested making her mom laugh. That was a clear sign that her mom was not going to give up on this and that Katie should just give in already.

It was even weirder to have some strange woman with a tape measure measuring her chest. The employee stood back, did some quick math and quickly announced “34B” before excusing herself to find some undergarments in that size. Katie took a second to think of the number just placed while her mom made sure her daughter knew that knowing this sizing was a good thing. Katie had thought they were smaller than that, she knew she wasn’t as flat chested as she used to be, but she didn’t think she was a B cup. The more you know right? Well, all she wanted to know was when she could leave this cursed store.

The employee came back with multiple choices, many of them too lacy for her taste, and started talking about her choices. She got some in the proper size and also some with a C cup due to weird measurements and rib sizing. Normally Katie would be all over the crunching of numbers but all she could think about now was how all bra sizes were a lie.

Finally, the two left the store of sparkles and too dim of lights in favor of other stores, such as one with a lot of denim and too low of lights. God Katie hated the mall. Three hours of her life wasted on finding new clothes equated to three hours of throwing out her old clothes. It was the circle of life.

Trudging upstairs, her arms weighed down with multiple bags of varying sizes, she recalled the fact that Lance had messaged her a while ago while she was in the hell store. The bags went in a heap at the foot of her bed as she pulled out her phone. The messaging screen was the first thing she was faced with after unlocking the device and she let out a heavy sigh in contemplation of what to write. She might as well be honest.

**7:15 pm**

_I’m dead._

_I just spent the last 3 hours of my life shopping_

_One of those hours was dedicated to fucking Victoria’s Secret_

_Haha rippp_

_I get it though, I have a lot of sisters._

_It’s worse when the shit being purchased is for you_

_Wait_

_You’RE A GIRL???_

Katie’s eyebrows shot up, and covered her mouth to stifle a laugh. The response was immediate and oh so perfect.

It’s not like Katie had specified her gender, and she had also introduced herself as Pidge, and old nickname of hers, so the confusion was passable. The real question would be it this would change anything. Some guys were assholes about this stuff, but also this was Lance. The random guy who flirted with her so… was he gay?

So many questions floated around in her head because this guy did not make sense.

_Did you seriously not know that?_

_Well it’s not like your name makes it evident!_

_Well I’m sorry that my nickname isn’t gender specific!_

_THAT’S A NICKNAME??_

_How dense are you???_

_JEsus_

_Hold up a second_

_I need to think_

_Think away_

_I’ll still be here_

_In female form_

_So… what’s your actual name?_

_I swear if it’s a Pokémon name I’m going to cry._

_It’s Katie_

_…Katie?_

_Katie_

_That’s my name_

_Huh_

_That’s really cute_

_I fucking swear_

_But I’ll still call you Pidge because it sounds cooler ; )_

_Of course you would._

_Well now that you know I’m a female, what are you up to?_

_Babysitting my neighbor’s kids_

_They are so cute you don’t understand_

_Kids get into your shit and need constant attention how do you think that’s cute?_

_Wow_

_Negative are we?_

_I have a big family kids are no issue for me_

_I have a lot of stuff that isn’t kid friendly and I don’t want to be responsible for injuries_

_Haha_

_Yeah you never sounded like a kid person_

_Something I hear quite often_

_Wait gimme a second_

She took this chance as a small breather and let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. This was the longest she had ever talked with someone online not about robots. It was…nice. Lance was a chill guy even though he seemed a little questionable in the intelligence apartment. He barely changed even after he figured out she was a girl which surprised her. Then again he had used a pickup line on her twice already so he must be gay or something. Her thoughts were tossed away and instead a laugh made it past her lips. Lance had sent a picture of two young children sitting in front of a television watching Pokémon. Of course it would be Pokémon, why did that seem so obvious to her?

Despite her reluctance she had to admit the kids were cute and she quickly typed it out to please Lance. His reply was a bunch of emoticons.

_See I told you they were cuuuttee_

_No need for emphasis_

_I could see their backs and that was enough for me lol_

_Ok serious question though_

_If you are 3 hours ahead then are you on the east coast?_

_Yup_

_I live in Olkari_

_Woah really?_

_Isn’t that place super popular?_

_Yeah and its pretty overpopulated but we make do_

_That’s so cool_

_I’ve always wanted to go there : )_

_I live in Altea_

_Wow that’s really on the other side of the country_

_Isn’t that place ideal for Windows default background screens?_

_Le GAsp_

_How could you expose us like that??_

_Le gasp?_

_*gasps at you in Spanish*_

_Oh I hate it_

_Haha : )_

_Well it was nice talking to you m’lady_

_Ok you need to stop_

_Ha you know you like it ; )_

_I’ve got two gremlins to feed and you should try to sleep earlier tonight_

_You are not in charge if my sleep schedule!!_

_I am now HA!_

_GO TO SLEEP_

_ITS NOT EVEN 8_

_SLEEEEEEEEPPPP_

_Alright talk to you later Pidgie_

Ok it was now confirmed.

Katie had no idea what this guys was up to.

She dropped her phone and leaned back, falling onto the green comforter of her bed.  He was nice, that’s a given. He liked flirting with random people and taking care of kids, a weird combination. He was just a little bit of a goofball but nothing annoyingly so. He was a bit more than tolerable in her eyes. It was new.

The fact that this was only the second day they’ve ever talked was shocking to Katie. They acted like old friends, or as she and her old friends talked which was not much. She didn’t have too many friends admittedly. At school she focused on learning and was actually made fun of a lot so that wasn’t a good location to meet anyone. She mainly stayed at home and built prototypes with her brother. God if only Matt could see that she was ‘hitting it off’ with some guy online she would never hear the end of it.

A sick feeling twisted in her gut, but Matt wasn’t here. Who knew how long he and dad would be gone. There was a beginning date but no end, sketchy but they complied anyway. She turned onto her side and fiddled with her hands and the elastics on her wrist; a nervous habit that arose at the worst times. Although now she wasn’t sure if they were from missing her family or the stranger that stumbled upon her online.

“You talking to your girlfriend?”

“You’re like, seven, do you even know what that is?”

“Hunter at school has one, he talks about her a lot.”

“Oh does he now?” Lance laughed. These kids were a handful. The twins were very curious about everything and while Lance was watching them nothing happened without their opinions.

“Make sure you use gloves!” Oscar yelled from back in the living room while Lance pulled out chicken nuggets from the oven. Tristan was sitting at the small island in the middle of the kitchen making idle conversation with the Older teen.

“Almost forgot! Thanks!”

He obviously hadn’t forgot, but he couldn’t help but give these kids attention. They were just so cute, and even Pidge thought so! Or more so, Katie did. For some reason he was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that robot kid was a female. Not that he had any problem with it! He just didn’t expect it that’s all.

“Did you have a baby then?” Tristan asked nearly causing lance to drop the hot tray.

“What?!” Lance sputtered setting the tray down with a little more force than necessary.

“you screamed he’s a girl and isn’t that what they say when you have a baby?”

Oh. Lance forgot that the kid’s mom was a nurse.

“No no no, I didn’t have a kid and also I yelled out of shock, not screamed.” He assured.

“You screamed.” Oscar chided from the living room. Lance scrunched his face for a moment before yelling at the other twin to get his food before it got cold. These kids were going to be the death of him but oh god did he adore them. He could understand why Pidge didn’t like kids, some people just can’t handle this type of effort when it comes to a young child. For Lance it was no big deal though, something he prided himself in. On the plus side most kid’s seemed to like him so that made the whole situation a bit more manageable.

“Are they dinosaurs?” Oscar asked, peering up at the tray on the counter. His wide eyes shone as he identified the distinct, cartoon like shapes his food was molded into.

“Of course!” Lance laughed, “You guys won’t eat anything other than these ones.”

“That’s because we are the reason dinosaurs went extinct!” Tristan yelled. Oscar looked at his brother in confusion before turning back to Lance who was holding his hand and grimacing in pain after accidentally touching the hot tray. “What does extinct mean?” He asked. Lance took a moment to think for himself, how would one exclaim this to a seven year old…

“Well, extinct means they no longer exist. That’s why there are no dinosaurs roaming the earth today!”

Oscar blinked at him. “Are you sure there are no dinosaurs?”

“Uh.” He hesitated, “Let me see, give me a minute.” Lance laughed pulling his phone out from his back pocket. “Way to scare me kid.” He mumbled, watching as Oscar scolded his brother for trying to reach the still hot nuggets. He’d help them in a moment but right now he had essential info to gather.

Unlocking his screen, he was met with the chat with Pidge witch notified him that she was online. He had originally pulled out is phone to google his question but in a sudden burst of impulse he decided he had a better idea.

**4:45 pm**

_Ok so stupid question_

_Do dinosaurs, in any form, still exist?_

**4:50**

_The closest living relative to the T-rex is a chicken_

_You’re fucking with me_

_Pretty neat right?_

_I oWn tINY T-REXES_

_That’s one way to put it_

The new fact was quickly shared with willing young ears, their expressions expressing almost more excitement then Lance was feeling. Who would have thought, chickens where related to dinosaurs. The more you know.

“How did you know this?” Oscar asked, as curious as ever.

“Well, I know this girl Pidge who is crazy smart and she told me!”

“Is Pidge your girlfriend?” Tristan asked.

“What? No didn’t we already talk about this? Come on kid I’m not dating anyone.” Lance laughed grabbing the empty plates to deposit them in the sink. The kids ate like they haven’t seen food in days.

“Why is nobody dating you? You are a nice guy!” Oscar smiled standing on his toes to put his cup in the sink. He looked up at Lance, white teeth and bright eyes almost making lance melt. “Well some people don’t think that.”

“Those people are dumb!” Tristan yelled, this time he was in the living room trying to get the video to play once again. These kids and their Pokémon gave Lance serious nostalgia.

“They aren’t dumb. They just aren’t for me.”

Oscar tugged on Lances sleeve, dragging him towards the couch with the same bright smile. “Don’t worry! You’ll find someone who likes you!”

Lance chuckled, he really hoped so.

He really did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is one of the shorter ones so I'm sorry about that. There are also a lot of typoes and missing comma's so I pray it isn't too hard to read! This chapter is...well... interesting and borderline filler. I have the next chapter typed up and ready to go because my rule is I can only post when I have the next chapter finished- it's just how it works. Anyway, I hope yall enjoy this shitty chapter!  
> Kudos and comments are always amazing, And I hope y'all stick around : )


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A longer chapter for yall : )  
> Trigger warnings: bullying

It had been a week.

A full-fledged week since Lance had messaged her with that’s stupid pickup line and a compliment for her work. A whole seven days of talking in their spare time, making jokes and talking about life. Lance always a had a lot to talk about. He talked about his teachers, especially one that he swore had it out for him, and how tedious his classes were. His friends intertwined into the conversations on some occasions as well. He sounded like her had a lot of friends who treated him well, Katie liked that. She used to have friends who had stabbed her in the back so many times that she didn’t even want to go back to school. Somedays she still sees them and she makes a valiant effort to avoid them at all costs. The unfortunate thing was that they were always smoking in the bathroom and despite everyone’s efforts, still had yet to be kicked out of the school.

Lance often talked while he was babysitting his neighbor’s kids and talked about them or about his own family witch to Katie’s knowledge, was pretty big. Katie chipped in and talked somedays too, mainly making fun of Lance and talking about her latest project ‘Rover’. Lance didn’t understand the nitty gritty details of the hardware, but he got the bare minimum and that surprised her. Even after a week she was still trying to figure out the complex situation that is Lance’s intelligence.

It was still shocking to her that Lance never stopped messaging her. He would send a quick ‘how are you?’ message or send a complaint about school. Sometimes it would be another cheesy pickup line that she rolls her eyes at. It was weird, he used all of these pickup lines but not in an attempt to flirt with her. It seemed more so a way to break the ice, something to cheer Katie up. Who knew that shitty pickup lines from people across the country was what could brighten her day. Or maybe it was just Lance.

Admittedly, she didn’t mind the pickup lines. She had actually taken to writing down her favorites on a piece of paper taped to her desk. Some of her favorites were probably the worst such as, ‘Are you a keyboard? Because you’re just my type.’ Or one of the originals, ‘Are you made of copper and tellurium? Because you're CuTe!’ Because who didn’t love a good science pun?

She had to admit that when her mom found the paper it wasn’t so funny. Katie may have overreacted a bit in her explanation. She really couldn’t remember how the ordeal played out but she knew it ended with her mom laughing and her humiliated. Welcome to the Holt household- it would have been ten times worse if Matt had been there.

Katie’s phone let out a familiar ping signaling a new notification, her thoughts by default went to Lance. Of course he would message her now while she was actually trying to get something done. Her mom had yelled at her enough to put her clothes away from the shopping trip and they had remained at the foot of the bed until today. She had already hung up the majority and was just working on the underwear bag and wondering why she didn’t give her input on what she would and wouldn’t wear. Too late now.

She stared bored at her phone screen and dropped the undergarment into her drawer.

**1:20 pm**

_Pidgeeee_

_Do you have a snapchat?_

_Yeah?_

_I don’t use it though because I have no relevant friends on it._

_Good news for you!_

_You will now ; )_

Jesus Christ Lance, now she had to download it again. She had no real use for it before, she couldn’t believe that she was downloading again just for this one person.

_My username is techpigeons_

_I’ll find you : )_

In all honesty, Katie didn’t like snapchat. She thought it was inconvenient and inefficient. She liked going back through conversations but if she forgot to save something in the chat then it was gone. Also it pissed her off that she was the only one who saved the conversations. She didn’t want to go through the effort of hacking the app to save all chats immediately, and she still couldn’t find the setting to do that. Just an inconvenience to her, but sometimes the filters were fun. Only sometimes.

Snapchat notified her that she had gotten a request pulling her the slightest bit out of her irritation. Seeing the username Katie snorted, what the fuck was this username? She found the blankest wall in her room and took a picture typing out “Dude what the fuck is up with your username? TaylorTheSharpshooter420 sounds like it has a story behind it”

The reply came back seconds later with a picture of a ceiling fan, “We don’t talk about that. Mistakes were made.”

After that the conversation quickly moved into the traditional chat space pf the app.

_Must have been a lot of mistakes to end up with a username like that_

_Hey!_

_Snapchat won’t let you change your username_

_Let me live jesus_

_Don’t know why you didn’t just make a new account_

_Is this cyber bullying?_

_I’m contacting the authorities_

_This is abuse_

_Lmao_

_I’m going to tell them that a twelve year old gremlin told me to delete my account_

_Pff- that’s it?_

_And they probably play fortnight and win all the battles so they are mega aggressive_

_‘plays fortnight and is mega aggressive’_

_That’s my new tag line now_

_Also I’m 13 so I’m allowed to act this way_

_Please tell me you’re joking_

_I’m 14_

_Oh thank god if you were 13 I’d be scared of you_

_Are you only scared of 13 year olds?_

_Only 13 year olds_

_That’s pretty sad Lance_

_My reasons are valid_

_Also I’m 16 so ha_

_Never would have guessed_

_I thought you were 9_

_Im11soshutthefuckup_

_You can’t tell but I’m clapping because I’m proud of you_

_Rip vine_

_It shall always be in our hearts…._

_Why are we like this_

_I don’t know you started it_

_Wait do you wanna start a streak??_

_You make it seem like it’s fun to receive black pictures with red S’s on them everyday_

_Well its not_

_But I put effort into mine!_

_Sooo a picture of a wall with a different colored S?_

_That’s pretty impressive_

_You really aren’t one for this stuff_

_If you lose the streak I will hurt you_

_Is that a yes??_

_Yes_

_; )))))_

Of course he would end the conversation with that- it just seemed like a Lance thing to do. Recently Katie’s mind had been working against her in the aspect that she really didn’t mind Lance. Sure, she put a filter over half of the stuff she wanted to share to try not and make things awkward, but she also couldn’t tell why. Lance was becoming less of an acquaintance and more of an actual friend. Her stomach twisted the slightest bit when she heard her phone go off again, a slightly sickening feeling laced with something else. A shudder wracked her body at the strange feeling, what the hell was that? Trying her best to ignore the strange reaction, she picked up the phone once more.

_Pic 4 pic? ; )_

_That sounds so wrong Lance_

_I’m joking with you ha_

_We don’t know what each other look like so?_

_Sounds sketchy_

_I’m not going to send you a picture of my dick jesus_

_Good I don’t want to see your ‘dick jesus’_

_‘dick jeus’_

_Oh that’s just sad_

_I h a t e_

_But you wanna see what all the ladies want?_

_Wait NO THAT’S WRONG_

_I’m starting to trust you less and less_

_ITS NOT WHAT IT SEEMS_

_DUDE_

_You want me to send a shitty selfie?_

_Yes-_

_Thank god you understand_

_And you’re going to send a selfie of your dick_

_…_

_No pidge_

_I’m not going to send you that wtf_

_You sound like you want to see it now_

_It sounded like you wanted to send me one_

_I dOn’t wAnt to send you a pic Of MY DIcK_

_Good!_

_I don’t want to see your dick!_

_I don’t want you to see it either!_

_Have we come to a compromise?_

_NO FUCKING DICK PICS_

_CORRECT_

_Prepare yourself for the shittiest selfie you will ever receive_

_Open at the same time? ; )_

_Mmm nope_

Katie was still sitting in front of her drawers with miscellaneous clothing strewn around her in a circle. Not only that but she was wearing a sports bra and short as fuck running shorts- not something you send a picture in if you weren’t a skimpy middle school hoe. To her pride, she never was one of those ruling her current clothing out of the question. Her eyes landed on a stray shirt laying on her bed and opted it was her best bet.  Snatching the fabric and throwing it on she took around thirty seconds to take two pictures and pick between the two of them. A notification sang that Lance had already send one causing a happy little exhale at the thought that Lance would send a dick picture just for the joke of it. She didn’t want to see his dick! It would just be funny in context- but dicks were weird as fuck. She didn’t want to see that.

No filter or stickers, she sent the picture and bit her thumb in anticipation as Lance opened the picture almost three thousand miles away. She shouldn’t be this nervous.

It would be one of the biggest lies ever if one was to say he wasn’t blushing. The brunette could feel the heat rise to his cheeks and crawl down his neck just looking at the photo he received. Shit, why did they do this over snapchat? A part of him wanted to save the picture forever, but not in the creepy way! Just in case he forgot what she looked like...? He couldn’t find a valid reason, but she was so _cute._

It wasn’t a skilled selfie in the least, it made him cringe actually in the way that the lighting was off and that her arm was clearly present in the screen. Either way, he couldn’t close the picture in fear of losing the sight.

She had light brown hair that was thrown into an unruly ponytail that looked like it had been un for hours. Her brown eyes shone like topaz in the bad lighting and the shirt she wore was wrinkled but complimentary. For a nerd like herself the pose of a piece sign joined with her tongue out in a small smile was strangely working, even though it also felt like she was mocking him. This was not the girl he thought she was, she was cute and normally that doesn’t happen when it comes to nerds online.

Shuddering, his quickly closed out of the picture and exhaled deeply- this was going to be a challenge.

The app read that Pidge had opened the picture and was currently typing. Lance’s heart sped up unnecessarily in anxiousness, he shouldn’t feel like this but the overwhelming urge to prove himself took control.

_You look like a fuckboy_

Lance pursed his lips and dropped his phone onto his bedsheets, it intermingling with the books he had strewn about- to hell with anxiety. This was probably the best response he could have hoped for. Finally, being able to breathe again, and mentally scolding himself for being lame, he picked up the conversation with his ‘Lance charm’.

_And you look like a nerd_

_What else were you expecting?_

_A cheerleader?_

_I expected braces and a band uniform but you surprised me ; )_

_I’ll have you know that I dropped band in 5 th grade _

_WoAh_

_Band is BeAutiFul_

_And then my parents made me join orchestra_

_There’s no escaping_

_That’s accurate._

_Anyway ; )_

_You like what you see?_

_If you’re asking if fuckboys are my thing_

_The answer is no_

_All you’re missing is the stupid snapback_

Lance stuck his tongue out at his phone in an act of childish rebellion. Out of the corner of his eye he could see his snapback on his dresser which he quickly disregarded. He wasn’t that basic, I mean, no ladies fell for basic guys. They fell for cool ninja sharpshooters! Aka, him.

_For a 14 year old midget you are pretty savage_

_For a 16 year old fuck boy I’m amazed you associate yourself with me_

_Woah you saying I don’t have standards?_

_I’m saying they are the lowest on the planet._

_I’m surprised you didn’t yell at me for calling you short._

_You don’t know my height lmao_

_wAit_

_you better not be 5’9 like fucking jojo_

_pff- nope you are in luck_

_ok good_

_because if you were I’d cry_

_can’t have a girl be taller than you?_

_It hurts my pride man_

The conversation was interrupted when a sturdy knock sounded at his door. Lance’s head whipped around to look at the wood expectantly as if whoever was there could just barge in at any second.

“Hey Lance! It’s me!”

“You Hunk!” He yelled throwing his phone and opening the door for his best friend. A part of him felt bad for leaving Pidge on read but she wouldn’t have done the same. Even if there wasn’t something else she needed to do… wow he needed to get to know this kid more.

“How’s it going buddy?” Lance asked, a wide smile plastered on his face. He just couldn’t help it, Hunk just made him happy! “Mm, good! I’ve been working on the extra credit that was posted about making a working simulation for a flight test, miniature sized of course, and it’s really difficult. Because of that I’ve decided that you can help!”

Lance laughed nervously, “Uh, dude you know I suck at that stuff.”

“You’ll do fine!” Hunk insisted sitting in Lance’s desk chair, “I’ll be doing most of the work anyway.”

“And I can be moral support?” Lance offered, taking a seat on his bed that had yet to be made. One of his blankets fell of the bed at his movements and Lance stared at it with disappointment.

Hunk sighed, “Lance you are smarter then you look-“

“Hey!” He yelled, offended, but Hunk just waved it off. “You could probably learn how to do this if you put in the effort, but I know you won’t. Still I want you to help because everything is more entertaining with you there anyway.”

“Ha, thanks buddy.” Lance sighed throwing himself back into the mess of sheets.

Hunk looked at his friend expectantly, “How about you? You doing ok Lance?”

Lance mumbled his reply at first, but when there was no response he cleared his throat loudly and tried again. “I’m talking to that online person again.”

“Oh! The robot kid?”

“Mhm, the robot kid, who also happens to be a really cute girl who lives across the country.” He groaned.

The Samoan blinked in confusion, “Did you just figure this out or have you been keeping information from me?”

“We’ve gotten in trouble every time I’ve tried to talk about her so I never got a chance.”

“Ah that’s right isn’t it.” Hunk agreed, remembering that Iverson had yelled at the pair again because of Lance’s talkative nature in class. “Wait, how do you know she’s not a catfish!?”

Lance sat back on his forearms in amuse at Hunks worried face before groaning again and falling back on the mattress with a thump. “The selfie was so bad, like my grandma trying to take a selfie bad. Plus, it was on snapchat and clearly had just been taken so she shouldn’t be a catfish. Also she’s way too much of a nerd to be like that, and who the hell would catfish under the disguise of a fourteen year old savage nerd of a child?”

“Sounds like you two have been talking a lot.” Hunk laughed, “You finally moving on with your crush on Allura?”

“I’ve been over my ‘crush’ with Allura ever since she ‘crushed’ my heart.” He sassed back. “I’m done with her! She doesn’t care about me Hunk! I might as well give up while I’m behind. She can go run off with Mr. Fancy pants while I sit in the dirt behind them.”

“Yeah you still like her.” Hunk sighed.

“Of course I still like her!” Lance yelled, sitting up forcefully. “She’s a goddess and smart and mature and she always knows what she’s doing, and she deserves someone so much better than that…that prick!”

The pair sit in silence in the small bedroom, the simple chime of Lance’s phone interrupting the heavily sympathetic vibes running through the air.

“But it’s fine.” Lance finally stated, “I’ll get over it eventually. Maybe I’ll hit on Romelle.”

“I’m pretty sure she’s a lesbian.”

“And my family thinks I’m gay, it works out.”

As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she couldn’t get Lance out of her mind. It wasn’t like a creepy fangirl kind of thinking, but more of an analyses. He didn’t look that bad, just a little bit like a fuck boy, but a nice fuck boy. Katie knew he wasn’t a dick- he just looked like the type of guy to pretend like he was all high and mighty and then turn around and apologize a moment later. His face was weirdly symmetrical and his eyes looked like the ocean, not something she saw that often. His eyes were just so… bright.

She viciously shook her head and ground her hands into her cheeks earning a few suspicious stares from around the classroom. Normally she was the one being serious but now she just couldn’t focus. It’s not like what she was doing was important anyway, it was study hall. The teacher was an old woman who was half deaf and cared even less about her students so people used that to their advantage. For example, a girl next to her was sleeping as if she hadn’t in a week. Katie decided she just wasn’t having it today and quickly raised her hand in hopes of grabbing the teacher’s attention.

“Yes, Ms. Holt?” The old woman grumbled. Her voice was gravely and spotty like a radio with bad connection. “May I use the restroom?”

The teacher waved Katie off with her solemn stare. Katie grabbed her stuff much too forcefully and pushed the heavy door open. She did need to use the restroom, but also skipping came after that. The Holts had a policy with skipping- only skip during study hall, that was the rule, no ifs ands or buts. Matt used to abuse that rule a lot.

Katie sighed happily at the fond memory. She really hoped him and dad were doing ok at the lab. With a grunt she pushed the door open to the girls’ bathroom and froze, oh of course those girls would be in there.

There was a group of girls who always skipped out on study hall and made a routine of hiding in the bathroom. There was a handful of girls who were using the small the room for the intended use, hence the hand dryers going off. Katie would never understand why girls were so scared of hearing people pee, it was a bathroom! What did they expect?? But nope, they have to hit the fan or else nothing gets done. Now she just wanted to bolt from the bathroom. Shehe would have been fine if her one, or more appropriately, two problems, weren’t sitting on the sink counter. Two older girls were perched there making out with such ferocity it looked like they were going to try and procreate on the girls bathroom counter. At least they weren’t smoking this time, but Ezor and Zedrid only ever did so much. One of the girls, Zethrid, was a much bigger girl with pink under dyed hair that hadn’t been touched up in a month. Ezor was the opposite with being a skinny thot and having meticulously died hair in the most bizarre shade ranges that somehow still worked. Katie had mentally called them the rainbow bitches for the longest time, but now was the time to exit the premises.

Katie tried to move in a way that seemed inconspicuous but I proved itself futile when she made eye contact with Ezors blue eyes. It was make or break now- the final countdown and-

“Look the pigeon is back!” Ezor cheered, her eyes widening in a sick type of glee.

It was too late.

The last normal girl had left leaving Katie frozen in the school bathroom with the psychotic lesbians.

Ezor jumped off the counter while Zethrid more so dragged herself off it- did Katie mention how her ‘bigness’ was comprised in only muscle mass? The chic could crush her like aluminum.  Ezor pranced up and slung an arm over Katie’s shoulder humming a small unrecognizable tune, “Hi birdy, what brings you here?”

Katie shrugged the other girl’s arm off and bitterly replied with “using the restroom.” Ezor took a moment to fake contemplation before a snide smile appeared on her face, “Oh really? Because it looked like you were just standing in the doorway like a fucking creep.” Zethrid took this moment to join her girlfriend in the act of towering over Katie before lurching and grabbing the younger girl by the shirt and lifting her up. Katie yelled out in shock and dropped her bag on the tile, Ezor taking full advantage of the papers that resided in there. Katie was moved and slammed against the back wall, her head throbbing at the impact. Through her blurry vision she witnessed Ezor riffling through her things and stealing pictures of her finished work. Katie couldn’t find herself focusing on anything as the two girls talked back and forth about something she couldn’t pick up. Before she knew it, Katie was dropped on the floor and kicked into the center of the cold tile. Her head was pounding and could barely make out Zethrid making a show of dumping her water bottle onto the floor.

“Slipping in the bathroom is a really sad reason to be late to class.” Ezor sang and the two exited the restroom laughing while Katie curled into herself, hot tears tore down her face denying all hopes to not cry. The bell rang, loud and shrieking forcing the girl to haul her crumpled body off the floor and into the biggest stall with her stuff being dragged behind her. Who the fuck cares if she didn’t show up to class- she should have stayed in study hall. Tears continued to be released in thick streams as Katie, smaller than ever, let the sobs wrack her body.

After twenty minutes or so, Katie had calmed down and reduced to a tired sniffling mess. The bathroom door opened and the sound of hard bottomed shoes hit the floor. “Hello?” A confused voice called, probably seeing the large puddle in the center of the room. Katie picked herself off the ground, wiped her face on her sleeves and forced herself through the stall door. Once she reached the counters the only other bathroom resident took in the girl’s state of being.

“Oh my god- girl are you ok?!” Instantly from the voice Katie could tell that it belonged to Nyma, a natural bleach blonde who was one of the more decent stoners in the school. But she did have feelings and her worries were genuine. “Yeah-yeah, I’m just going to leave.” Katie sniffled, refusing to look at her weakness in the mirror. A comforting hand rested on her back and she found herself unconsciously leaning into it. “Do you need to go to the nurse?”

“No I’m just going to call home.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, thanks.” At that Nyma let out a sympathetic sigh, patted her back twice and disappeared inside a stall. With a shaky deep breath Katie picked up her stuff and exited the bathroom, starting her trek to walk off the campus and back to the comforts of her home- like hell was she letting her mother find out about this.

The front door opened quietly and Katie disabled the stoic alarm that was mounted on the wall. All the lights were off so her mom was still at work, she’d probably be there for quite a while longer. She didn’t even bother to turn on the lights as she slowly climbed the stairs and threw her bag down in the middle of her bedroom floor. Her clothes joined the pile shortly after when she aggressively pulled he blinds shut. The nice cascade of light that was once shining through we gone, leaving the room with an eerie and empty feeling. Katie barely payed attention to her own actions, barely noticing her ministrations to grab some new, more comfortable clothes. Retreating down stairs barely registered in her mind as an action when she found herself shoving the door open to the garage. In there sat her pride and joy charging on a table; rover. In her illusive state she half expected Matt to be down there laughing at a mistake she made, or awkwardly having to admit to using her supplies for his own projects. The sight of the empty room would have added to Katie’s mid-day depression but she just shrugged off the lack of company and began to unplug rover. The best thing to do in hard times was to make them even harder by playing with a finicky robot; it was something that kept her sane and functioning. In less than ten minutes of entering the garage, she was in her zone tinkering and living as if the rest of the world didn’t exist.

Lunch was the most hectic part of any day for Lance, it didn’t matter where he was or what he was doing, lunch was just crazy. Exhibit A, being the Garrison mess hall; the place where dreams came true and people mixed milk with ranch. One would think that being in a private school would sober some people up, but that only happened in movies. The students here just happened to be both extremely above the curve and idiotic at the same time, and amazing feat that had no means to be celebrated. Through the mess of tables and uniforms, all the way in the back corner of the cafeteria was where Lance sat on a normal day. Sometimes he had to move outside because some assholes didn’t understand the concept of ‘invisible seating charts’. Lance and his group has been sitting _there,_ for _so_ long that one would think that is was off limits. Alas, that was beyond the point- in simpler terms that table was where Lance and his group sat today. The group wasn’t big by any means, but it was one of the larger ones where people came and went differing to the weather. Today the table consisted of Lance, Hunk, Allura and a prick named Lotor- along with Shay and Plaxum at the other end.

“Please dude! Just a bite?” Lance pleaded at his unmoving friend, “Nope, not happening Lance. We made a deal and you broke it, so that means no food!” Hunk stated starting to pack up his remaining lunch to keep a hungry Lance out of it. “It was an accident!” He wined, “Please Hunk? You’re cooking is so good!”

Hunk’s face falter the tiniest bit but he remained content with the game of keep away he was playing.

“What did he do?” Lance’s exhausted smile fell at the girl’s query. That stupid British accents sounded so posh it made him want to scream, her silver-blonde hair was an inspiration for the gods; it was the one and only, bitch Allura. Lance knew she saw the bitter in his eyes when she spoke making her quickly divert all attention to Hunk and repeated the question. Hunk, being the good friend he was, hesitated at first and made subtle eye contact with Lance before carefully responding.

“Well, you see I asked Lance to help me on this project but I had to bribe him with food. So in exchange for his help I was going to give him my lunch, instead he didn’t press the save button on the documents and we lost around two hours of data.”

Allura’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, “That doesn’t sound too bad, unless his only job was to press that button.”

“Because that’s what you would only let me do.” Lance mocked quietly in Allura’s direction. She never let him do anything in group projects.        

“What did you say?” Demanded the girl, her head whipping around to look at a particularly helpless Lance. He froze under her piercing gaze.

“What? Can a guy like me not have freedom of speech? Why do you even care that I mess up, you want to rub it in or something? “

“No! What is up with you? I sit right here I should have a right to know what you guys are talking about!”

“Welp, sucks for you because you really don’t.” The Cuban shrugged.

“Heh, uh guys? Can we not start a fight in the lunch room?” Hunk pleaded nervously, all his hopes dissipated the next second when Allura rose from her chair and stomped around the table to Lance.

“Why are you acting like this Lance, you are being so immature!” She scolded placing her hands on her hips. Lance lazily looked up at the furious girl and laughed dryly. “Why do you think?”

Her eyes widened marking the end of an era when she lost it. “Ugh! Are you kidding me right now?! I thought we talked about this and came to a consensus but you are just an immature little kid who holds onto grudges like a life support!”

“Well excuse me Princess,” He retorted standing up to gain some leverage on the argument, “But I’m not mad at you- I’m mad at that fucking prick who is for some reason **_still at our table._** ”

“Lotor?” Allura gasped, “That’s your problem?!”

“Yes that it my problem! Glad you finally noticed.”

The man in context, Lotor had frozen and was meekly slouching down in his seat, unaware of why the two were fighting so viscously about him.

“If you hate him so much than leave!” She yelled. Lance yelled in frustration, she was clearly not getting it. “No, he should leave! You are the only person who wants him at this table., clearly he doesn’t belong because he doesn’t do anything. Hell! He doesn’t even contribute in conversations, why you may ask? Because he is _not_ our friend.”

Furious blue eyes met blue and Allura stood down, biting her lip and grabbing her stuff, aka, Lotor, and rushed through the crowd and out the back door.

Once the duo had successfully exited the room Lance’s eyes fell and he slumped back into his seat ignoring the shocked looks from everyone at the table. He carelessly mushed his cafeteria food around on his tray in a half living state. You could hear the empathy of Hunks voice cut through the shocked tension in the air when he whispered Lance’s name. Lance then just got up, grabbed his stuff and left the table ignoring all protests. They just want him there to make him feel wanted, he knew he wasn’t so why should they lie?

On his way through the crowd he roughly shoulder checked a late Keith who was headed to the table. “Woah, Lance I think you’re taking this rivalry bullshit too far-“

“Fuck off Keith.” Lance said, not even looking back to see his shocked expression. Lance may be an ass to him, but he never openly cussed at him. A weary glance over to the table confirmed that no one fully understood what was going on.

Before Lance knew it he was walking home through the mud, trying desperately to keep his tears at bay and sniffling in the outside air. It had been getting colder since school got in session and the clouds looked anxious to start raining on unsuspecting civilians. Right now, Lance couldn’t care less about the rain or the few drops that touched the concrete in front of his feet. The water was warm down his face as he continued to walk towards his save haven where silence was rare and happiness was prominent. More rain rushed down blurring his vision and in a vain attempt to rub the water out of his eyes he choked on a sob. It wasn’t raining.

It was just him.

It was much later in the evening when Lance found himself seated on a couch in his neighbor’s house, the rowdy twins playing some sort of imaginary game. The boys jumped around with nerf guns pretending that they were some type of Defenders of the Universe. Lance just sunk into the couch cushions and watched in amusement as the boys bickered about their make believe world. It sounded like a DnD game crossed over with transformers, there were magic lions that turned into ships and alien species that threatened to take over the earth.

“And then Lion One crashes into the Alien ship and saves the world!” Oscar cheers, ramming the stuffed lion toy into the ‘alien’ that took form of a dusty purple giraffe toy. “But wait! There’s another ship coming! It’s going really fast! Lion 2 to the rescue!” Tristan yelled triumphantly, while Oscar looked borderline disappointed at his brother’s actions. “Uh… It’s going to fast! We have to escape?” He tried, but Tristan just laughed. “No, we must fight for the sake of the universe!”

The two ran around the room with their lions and made adorable sound effects for what they thought lion robots sounded like. Lance just couldn’t help but laugh, the scene was all too precious. He sat up a bit more and peered behind him as Tristan ran to another section of the house, he craned his neck to try and see where the boy was. Tristan quickly immerged and threw something at Lance, “Lion 3 help us!” Tristan yelled as he joined his brother in running around the room. Lance looked down to see the object thrown at him was none other than another lion plush, this one in blue. “Hey guys!” Lance called, a smile appearing on his face, “I’ve got an idea.”

The boys stopped their game in favor of running over to Lance and staring at him with their big eyes. “Ok, so why don’t the lions have names?”

The twins stood their awkwardly for a moment before Oscar shrugged.

 “Well how about we call them what colors they are!” Lance exclaimed, “That would be easy right? Oscar has the Yellow lion, Tristan has the Red lion and I have the Blue lion!”

Tristan’s eyes widened in joy and he jumped up to crash a hug into Lance before zooming off screaming “Red Lion to the rescue!!!” Oscar quickly joined him with a much quieter version of his cheer.

“AHH! The aliens have laser guns- Pow pow pow pow!!” Lance yelled jumping off the couch to join the kids game. Not to sound condescending, but he made the game ten times better with his sound effects. It lasted a long time, long enough for Hunk to find his way over and to be met with a bunch of kids and Lance playing with plush toys and screaming.

Lance tore himself out of the game really fast to look up and give an apologetic smile to Hunk who was just staring at him in the doorway confused as ever. “Just give me a couple of minutes’ dude.” Lance yelled.

“I thought you were going to try to work on the essay we have due tomorrow?” Hunk asked, picking up Lances phone to look in his notes to see, yup, it was written right there to work on the essay. Lance had a habit of forgetting stuff so he wrote it all down in his phone, but them he would forget he wrote it there and nothing would get done. Hunk was shocked that Lance had told him to meet him in the first place, especially at his neighbor’s house after that fiasco that went down during lunch. Hunk had called him several times to make sure he was ok since he had left school, but the only response he got was to meet up to work on the essay they had due. If Hunk knew Lance at all than he knew that Lance would not talk about what happened at all. Lance either calls you over to complain for a half hour or he keeps it to himself. Hunk prefers the former because he knows the dark shit that runs through Lance’s mind when he’s left alone with his thoughts.

Lance was still running around with the kids, a big smile on his face as he ran around with the unnatural colored lion. He was laughing and looked as happy as ever in this moment, Hunk help but open Lance’s phone again and pull up snapchat to take a video and capture these minutes of joy. He quickly was saving it right as Lance fell to the floor and was pummeled by the little kids, “Ok, OK! Enough!” He laughed under the weight, “The blue lion was merely backup, you guys did all of the work! Now you have to let me go because I’ve got work to do.” The kids did the typical groan and protests but eventually rushed to the other side of the house where their rooms were, leaving Lance in a pile on the floor. “You good there, Lance?” Hunk called from where he was leaned up against the back of the couch. Lance laughed and gave a thumbs up, hauling himself off the floor. “You take a video?”

Hunk nodded and Lance walked over to watch.

“Wow, we look so dumb.” Lance laughed taking his phone back.

“You’re playing with kids, if anything its cute.” Hunk shrugged, “Now you ready to work on this essay?”

Lance let out a deep sigh and flopped back onto the couch. “Never.”

While Hunk emptied out his bag of necessary supplies, Lance hovered his thump over the send button for a certain contact, a moment of contemplation and he pressed it sending the video and releasing the breath he was holding. Pidge probably needed something like this at the moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! I had fun writing it : ) More exciting stuff will be happening soon so stick around if ya want!  
> Comments and Kudos are really supportive!   
> Thanks for reading : )


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Skyppeee???

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ehhh the first half is rocky but it's fine. I've had this chapter typed out for over a month now whoops.

The light of her phone was the only thing keeping her awake as the figures dances around the screen. Excited yells erupted from the speakers still sounding happy even with the volume at its lowest. Katie was almost scared to close out of the video, it had been going on loop for at least ten minutes now making the dark atmosphere of the empty garage feel like home. It was late and she was getting delusional.

It was a short video taken on Lance running around a living room with two little boys, all of them holding a different colored lion plush and ‘attacking’ a purple giraffe toy. It was ridiculous and adorable at the same time when Lance starts yelling “Pow Pow Pow!” And racing towards the giraffe, knocking it off the table. It ended at that and all Katie would question is what noise was he even making?

Katie sat up and stretched, popping her back after sitting hunched for god knows how long. Without thinking she tapped off the video, quickly regretting the loss of the childish humor that resided in it. She rubbed her eyes viciously and took a look through the dark noting where rover was along with all of the bits and pieces she had thrown around were. The soft yellow light seeping through the cracks in the door cast strips of yellow across the room reflecting off a certain piece of glass on the table. Her attention piqued at the glint on the table and hauled herself off the floor muttering curses at her sore body. Her eyes widened when she realized what the glass was in; a pair of circular glasses. Matt’s glasses. Katie gentle cradled them in her palms as if her small hands would shatter the glass and crumble the frames.

She sat herself down into a nearby swivel chair next to the table and smiled tiredly. She remembered when Matt came home and claimed he didn’t need glasses anymore. He seemed so proud of himself for being able to see on his own. Katie remembered laughing at him because he was being a dork, but now here she was. Carefully she lifted the glasses to her own face, a light haze of dust blurred the image and the prescription itself took a moment to focus. Matt never had bad vision, but mildly inconvenience vision. He probably could have been one of those kids who had glasses but never had to wear them, he opted to wear them all the time though because he thought they ‘looked cool’. God she missed her brother.

The door open carefully, shedding more light onto the her and the shit all over the table. Katie looked up towards the door to see her mom standing there calmly. She made a small gestor motioning her daughter to come over there and Katie dragged to feet over to where her mom was. Immediately she was wrapped in a warm and secure embrace that she melted into. It took all her might to not cry, she knew her mom missed dad and Matt too. They’d be back before too long.

That’s what she hoped at least.

…

**10:42am**

_Yo pigeon_

_Pigeotto_

_*pidge_

_I love auto correct_

_I wanna do something_

Five obnoxious dings from her phone sent her sprawling for the device that was now the bane of her existence. What the heck was even happening, was her phone malfunctioning or? Wait, nope. Just Lance.

_Wat do yu want_

_Dude are you drunk?_

_Tired_

_Do not tell me you just woke up omg_

_*u wok me up_

_Isn’t it 11 over there?_

_You should be up by now_

_Also do you not have school???_

_Mm I’m skipping_

_*lE gASp_

_We doing this again?_

_I can’t believe you._

_What do your parents think of your life choices?_

_Highly_

_I was told to stay home today so jokes on you._

_You sick or something?_

_Nope_

_Alright then…_

_Well my free period is almost up._

_I thought you wanted to do something?_

_Later_

_Wanna skype?_

_What_

_Why?_

_Because I don’t know you that well and talking in person is more fun_

_But clearly we don’t get to do that so skyping it is!_

_What do you say?_

_I’m half asleep Lance_

_What do you expect me to say?_

_uhh_

_Yes?_

_Go to class lance._

On that note Katie hauled the blankets off her form and stood up to find a mirror.  That mirror was not a pretty sight. She looked like a goddamn mess. Her hair was all over the place. He shorts were too loose and hanging low on her hips while her tank top was in a similar state as well by dropping off her shoulders. Thank god she didn’t go to school today or she probably would have arrived in a similar state to this. It was one of those days where she had zero intention of doing anything, so she reached for a brush on her dresser and got to work.

A little later her mom came in and decided to help her disheveled daughter brush out her hair without ripping it all out. Once that was done Katie made the questionable choice to leave it down as she continued with her day. Coffee first, and then homework and then maybe get dressed. Her checklist was small but it took time. She purposely dragged out the coffee part because she mainly just wanted an excuse to drink more of the heavenly liquid.

Another steaming cup accompanied her while she did her math homework around one pm, and then around two pm her mom cut her off. She did this by hiding the coffee filters and unplugging the machine in hopes to get the message across. Katie always found it amusing that her mom had a limit for her caffeine intake. She was the type of person to research what energy drinks did to people and was quick to cut Katie away from those. She still had some on occasion though.

 It was getting much later in the day and Katie was dutifully reading and taking notes that would probably never come in handy. She reached over to scroll through the document and made the mistake of tossing her pen off the bed. Cursing lightly, she leaned over the side, trying not to fall off and reaching slightly under the bed to find the writing utensil. As she touched her hand to the pen her knuckles grazed the side of some rough fabric. Confused, she reached a bit farther and grabbed whatever the material was. It felt like canvas but when it was pulled out from its hiding, dusty and monotone, she knew exactly what it was.

She carefully dragged herself off the side of the bed and onto the floor to undo the zipper and smile at the contents. She hadn’t played in at least a year or two, life had just been too busy. Inside was a concert sized ukulele that she had received a few years ago for her birthday. She had loved this thing, she used to play it all the time. Not so much sing though, she didn’t really have any vocal talent. Katie lightly dragged he finger tips over the strings before pulling the instrument out and setting the case aside.  What songs did she even remember? It had been so long.

“Am, G, C…” She muttered gently to herself, fingers instinctively finding their spot on the finger board. It was the simplest song known to anyone but it was the one that came to mind. Strumming the pattern she remembered, her fingers followed suite and she started to hum along with the lyrics. She remembered the first night she got the instrument, she had no idea why she got it but Matt was adamant on getting her to play it. The two had stayed up for hours as Katie tried to strum and do the fingerings at the same time. It took another couple days for her to sing correctly with it. She smiled recalling the memories, mom had to come in at nearly midnight and plead them to stop playing. It kind of played into the whole joke of Katie sucking at playing, Matt had joked that even their own mother couldn’t stand it.

In all honesty, she wasn’t that bad. Those were really only her first nights of playing so of course it was going to suck. Katie carefully plucked the strings and readjusted the knobs, straining her ears to remember what an in-tune uke sounded like. Again, it had been forever.

Just a little more tweaking and….

Her phone chimed. Once, twice, three times…

She groaned, tossing her instrument to the side and stomping over to her phone. She relaxed when seeing it was only Lance. She stood there in confusion for a moment, who else would it be? Lance had been the only person to text her besides Matt and Matt probably got his phone confiscated the moment he walked into the lab.

She unlocked the screen and pursed her lips at the unnecessary amount of texts flooding her inbox.

**7:13pm**

_Pidge_

_Pidge_

_Pidge_

_Pidge_

_Pidgee_

_Katie_

_Pigeoto_

_Literally one message will suffice_

_Had to make sure you were awake_

_Why the hell would I not be awake?_

_Idk man but just making sure_

_Anywayyy_

_Wanna skype?_

_Didn’t you just get out of school?_

_Yeah so it’s a great time_

_You down?_

_Give me your skype loser_

_Wow hurtful words pidgee_

_Spell my name right for once you heathen_

_Nah_

_Ok my skype is Sharpshooter4ever_

_Who would have thought. Your usernames still suck_

_I’ve accepted that fact no thanks to you._

_I made them a long time ago!_

_Excuses_

Katie searched up the ridiculous username in her computer and typed out a quick message that received a quick response. The had typed ‘call me when you’re ready’ and her stomach was doing flips. Yes, she was nervous. Anyone would be! She was going to kind of meet this random stranger she started talking to; ok that didn’t sound the best, but it was still nerve wracking. Her computer monitor chimed displaying Lances username picture and the call screen- at that moment Katie’s heart really did jump.

She was still in her sleep clothes.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit.” She muttered scrambling to her dresser and finding the first thing her small hands could grab. It was an oversized green sweater that she had had for years but never mind that at the moment. She threw off her tank top and put on the sweater bare underneath. She prayed to the gods she didn’t believe in that her breasts weren’t noticeable underneath. It was just too hot in her room to have more than one layer. 

She answered the call and threw her hair into the most disgusting bun possible as the connection evened out. The pixilation dissipated and leaving in its wake a teenage boy in what looked to be a bedroom painted a tasteful blue color. He appeared to be fixing his settings because soon the mic on his computer was activated and the rusting of his movements were coming through to Katie’s side.

Oh how she wanted to hide under her bed and forget this entire reaction.

She was nervous.

Why was she still nervous?!

Lance’s eyes flicked to the screen finally blinking multiple times before Katie heard one of the cutest laughs ever. “Hey!” He smiled and Katie felt so weak.

“Hey.” She returned with a stupid wave. She had never felt this awkward in her life.

“So… the names Lance. You come around her often?” He flirted. Katie stifled a laughed and instead opted to role her eyes. “How long are you going to keep flirting with me? That doesn’t even work in the context we’re in.”

“I know!” He laughed, fuck that laugh, “But I got to always be on my A-game if I want to get anywhere.”

“With me or someone else?” She teased, readjusting her sweater higher towards her collarbone.

“We’ll just have to see.” He smirked, but it soon faded into a soft smile. “Your actual name is Katie, right?”

Katie wrinkled her nose and shook her head, her stomach did a weird flip-flop at the mention of her name.

“Keep calling me Pidge. It’s weird hearing my actual name from you.”

“Wow rude!” He gasped, “I’m offended.”

“Oh please, not even my brother calls me Katie. The majority of the time he calls me Pidge so you can say I’m just more comfortable with that.”

“Whatever you say Pidgee.”

“Still not a Pokemon.” His laughed rang through again. It was a laugh that didn’t have any annoying qualities like most. It was just a… cute simple laugh. When did she start caring so much about laughs?

“So…” He started again, straightening his posture making Katie aware of just how hunched she was. “You look like you just woke up.” He stated.

“Ok, I can explain-“

“Woah do not tell me you decided to take a nap! If I can’t sleep all hours of the day then you can’t either!” He argued. Katie waved her hands in front of the monitor to get his attention and laughed, “No, no. I was actually doing stuff today, I just never got dressed so it feels like morning still.”

“How the hell does it still feel like morning to you?”

Katie sighed, “Because my day doesn’t truly start unless I manage to put a bra on. But clearly it’s not too noticeable.” She blew an unruly strand of hair out of her face and tried to gauge Lance’s reaction. He seemed mildly shocked at the new, unnecessary info he just received, but he didn’t seem weirded out in anyway. But then again he did state he had sisters so this type of open talk shouldn’t have been too new for him.

“So, um. Hi?” He laughed nervously again.

“I thought we already exchanged greetings.” Katie stated as lance pouted back at her. “Well yeah we did but- it’s not like I know what I’m doing.” He sighed.

“You’re the one who wanted to do this Lance.” Katie huffed. On the back of her neck she felt strands of her hair fall out of the bun slightly irritating her. “You said you wanted to get to know me so now here I am!” She exclaimed throwing her arms out, the monitor cutting off her hands from Lance’s sight.

“Hey you remembered my name!” Lance cheered. Katie gave him a really weird look at that. Of course she remembered his name, she’d been suing it hadn’t she?

“Why wouldn’t I know your name? I address you as Lance is our conversations…” She trailed off while Lance’s face morphed into one of mild embarrassment.

“Well, you see… People kind of have a tendency to forget my name?”

Katie squinted at him waiting for some more elaboration.

“And I also forget names a lot too! So I-“ a short laugh interjected the sentence-“kind of have a notebook on my phone where I write down the names of people I meet. If I forget then I have to check back there and some part of my mind convinced me that you did something like that too… but now I’m realizing that it wouldn’t make sense in any context.” He trailed off, his hand going behind his head to scratch his neck. A nervous habit, Katie assumed.

Lance laughed again and brought his arm back down and waved in dismissal. “I actually had a section like, for you? No that’s not right, like about you? Oh god that sounds creepy.”

Katie rolled her eyes and stifled a smile. “Totally not creepy.”

“Hey don’t make fun of me!” He laughed. “It just had your names in it so I could remember! I also wrote down your contact information so… yeah. It was information _you_ gave me so technically I have a right to remember it!” He claimed pointing his finger at Katie while her stomach did enough flips to make her throw up. It was not a good feeling and it was so uncomfortable.

“Hey you ok?” Lance’s voice cut through making Katie snap back from the section she was looking at on her bed. “Yeah, yeah I’m ok. Just dazed for a second there.”

“So you didn’t hear me talk about me documenting information?”

“Nah I heard all of that.”

“Damn it.” Lance cursed with a smile. “This is a great first impression isn’t it?”

Katie shrugged, “From the texting I figured it would turn out like this so I’m not surprised. You seemed like a dork.”

Lance deflated at her response with a pout. “Oh come on! I doubt I’m that bad to talk to, ou’ve got this beautiful face to keep you company!”

“I didn’t say you were bad to talk to, I said you were a dork.” She smirked.

This somehow lead into a spiral of a conversation. Mostly it consisted of Katie listening to Lance ramble about something that made no sense, but she managed to tolerate it. Lance was in no way the most annoying guy in the universe, but she could understand how he would get on some people’s nerves. She quickly noticed that Lance never ran out of things to talk about, alongside that he was adamant on getting Katie to add her input every once in a while. He would talk about his large family and then ask Katie about hers. Of course she didn’t really have much to say but she must have talked more during that call then she did in an entire week.

“So ok, hold up. I knew you were nerdy before, but actually? That’s just crazy.”

“Well someone has a got to do it!”

Lance laughed, “I know! But still, your dad and brother going to freaking Area 51-“

“Not Area 51 Lance-“ She interjected.

“’Not Area 51’ my ass Pidgee. If anything is Area 51 it’s that place. They are researching aliens!” He exclaimed. “Oh my god.” He gasped, “If your family finds something does that mean I could meet an alien??”

“Eh, I think that’s too much of a privilege for someone I met online like two weeks ago.” Katie smirked watching Lance roll his eyes.

“Speaking of witch, how long have we been talking anyway?” Lance asked. Katie’s mind halted, how long had they been talking? When did they meet? “I’m not actually sure.” She mumbled.

“Eh it doesn’t really matter anyway.” Lance shrugged.

“Wait no!” Katie exclaimed, “I want to figure this out.”

Lance watched the younger girl on the other side of the screen aa she mumbled to herself and counted off on her fingers. “We’ve been talking for a week and 2 days.” She determined. “So not even two weeks, that’s kind of sad.”

“Well hey, I’ve dated people before even knowing them for the two days’ part.” Lance laughed. Pidge scrunched up her face, “Now that’s actually sad.”

“Hey!” Lance protested, “Sure all of those were a horrible idea but I’m still here right?”

“That doesn’t change the fact that it was a horrible idea. How do you even get into relationship so fast? How does anyone actually??” She asked, exasperated. “Are looks the only thing that matters now days? Because that might explain why I haven’t been getting anything. Oh! And it also might be due to the fact that I’m not going to go out with a stranger.” She snapped. Lance stared at her in awe, mouth gape and all. Katie looked up and snapped out a distressed ‘what?’ before Lance broke out laughing.

There that twisting feeling was again, god she hated it.

She shoved the feeling aside in favor of watching the other teen try to explain how modern relationships worked witch she called bullshit on immediately. Sure, she didn’t get out of the house much but that was still incredibly stupid.

The two finally got around to wrapping up the call two hours later.

The time indicator on the app shocked Katie when she finally hung up. She’s never had a conversation that long, nor has she ever had her face up on screen that much. The only other times she’s skyped with someone was when she had her face half covered, or when the camera was pointed at the ceiling. She chewed the inside of her lip in confusion, raking her hands through her hair trying to make sense of the whole situation.

Nothing was making sense in her mind and she was almost dumb enough to call it an early night. It was only a bit past nine and if she slept now her entire sleep schedule would be thrown off.

She just needed to think.

What the fuck was she doing?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have an essay to finish but instead I'm doing this because I forgot to update haha.
> 
> Kudos and comments are greatly appreciated! They motivate me : )))

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you guys so much for reading! This is, in fact, a multichapter fic. Update schedule will hopefully not be too spread thin : ) Now Most of these chapters will be unedited just because I really don't have time on most days. if anything doesn't make sense please tell me and I will go in and fix it!  
> Kudos and comments fuel my motivation and I hope yall stick around! ; )  
> [Watering the plance ; ) ]


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